American Police = My Everyday Terror
I will never experience waking up to my house half blown to bits and my family dead in the rubble. I will never get on a public bus or train or go to a cafe or grocery store and wonder if someone will show up wearing an explosive vest and kill us all. That is not my everyday. Nor do I ever wish to have that be my everyday or my experience. My heart and soul goes to all the souls that suffer this life of extreme turmoil and hardship and for all who have tried to escape that life .. and come ... here. Where it’s supposed to be -- better. We’re supposed to be better. We don’t do that here.
I came to this country some 30 years ago thinking like all immigrants do, this is America. This is an amazing place of freedom and opportunity. Three decades later, I fear for my life every-time a police car passes by me on the road. Every-time I see blue lights in my rear view mirror at night. Every time.
You know what I experience every day?
Waking up filled with dread, wondering if for myriad reasons a uniformed police officer will decide that today is my day to die or because I did, said something or moved the wrong way that he HAD to shoot me. And I will have nothing to say about it -- because I’ll be dead.
That’s my everyday terror.
And no, I’m not a criminal, ex-convict or a suspected criminal. I’m not a deadbeat dad. I don’t have a warrant out for my arrest or a glove box filled of traffic violations. I’m just your average brown citizen who may have something wrong with his car on the side of the road one night, or maybe went over the speed limit a little when those lights get flashed behind me and then I pray for dear life that -- nothing happens.
It’s a different kind of terror. It’s the wrong kind of terror here in the land of the free. It’s the kind of terror where you leave your wallet in the cup holder because God forbid you have to “reach for it.”
This fear, it isn’t new by any means. It’s a fine American tradition going back to when black people weren’t even classified as people. They were three-fifths of a person. When the country went to war with each other over the right to own humans. When someone thought it was a grand idea to take people from their native home and enslave them here.
And trust me I understand fear when it comes to the color of my skin as well as the fear when your home is not in the ideal place to live. I lived in the New York City of the past when I first got to this country, where crime was rampant and in some neighborhoods you just knew by routine and “smarts” where to avoid, and when it was safe to be certain places, streets, blocks.
That was my everyday. You get used to it. Popular culture even acknowledged it. People live that life now, all over this country in towns and cities. And sure that’s not they way it should be, but it is. You know what shouldn’t be? You know what we should never get used to -- police officers killing minorities. Over and over again.
So today, right now, I am afraid of the police. All of them. It doesn’t matter if you have so many medals of honour and service that you can’t wear your dress uniform jacket.It doesn’t matter if you help orphans on the weekend and save puppies. I fear what you currently represent. I’m afraid of the institution of police.
When a reach for my wallet turns into a justified shooting -- I fear police
When during the process of an arrest, a black suspect dies unnecessarily -- I fear police
When you don’t resist, or fight and comply and still, you die -- I fear police
When a white man walks into a church, kills nine people and is arrested without so much as a gun drawn, but a black man with a broken tail light gets shot four times while sitting in his car -- I fear police
When your soul mate and partner says as you’re leaving the house, “Be safe” and what she really means is please don’t get pulled over and killed -- I fear police
When you have to explain to your teenage daughter about to get her license in a month that you’re terrified to drive these days -- I fear police
When we as a nation, have the same conversation over and over, mandate body cameras and technology to hold them accountable -- AND IT STILL HAPPENS -- I fear police
We rail on about mass shootings and closing our borders and having harsher gun laws and background checks. Meanwhile the people committed to protecting us -- the ones who are legally allowed to carry weapons -- they’re killing us. Right here. Today. In our own neighborhoods. And not just the “suspected” criminals or convicts on the run who might be dangerous.
Wanted: Black male, about 6 feet tall, bald, with beard/goatee suspected of ... -- now think about how many black men meet that description. I meet that description. Some of your favourite athletes and celebrities meet that description. The local shop owner down the street meets that description. It could be anybody.
See, it doesn’t matter if you’re African American, or West Indian or Haitian or African -- from the behind the wheel of a police car -- we’re all black. And with that profile -- comes a litany of rationalizations that allow this to happen as it has been -- for a long time.
But please, someone explain to me when we went from probable cause to “I shot you because...”
What situation in any instance outside of a bank robbery or a straight up shootout would you as a police officer see any reason to approach anyone with your gun drawn, safety off, ready to shoot? Shouldn’t that be the last thing you have to do and NOT THE FIRST??
When did we become so dangerous as members of the population that we deserve to be shot on site for even the slightest chance of suspicion? Suspicion should lead to investigation -- not death.
With the amount of black men in jail one would assume police have the arresting part of this down. But not so.
It would appear that instead, we’ve skipped right ahead to the judging and the penalty of judgement. The judgement that involves excessive use of force, or bullets, or both.
Now, we have situations and stories where a father, a son, a brother, a mother, a sister -- someone you possibly even know, could die. Not from a home invasion, or a mugging, not from a terrorist bomb, not from a disturbed gunman. Not even from joining the military and going to a war torn region.
They could die from the gun of those who bear the motto -- to protect and serve.
Everyday terror. Even when it is not in the news but you know it could happen to you or anyone else at any moment.
Everyday terror because the dead have no defense. It doesn’t matter what the truth was -- it will die with you.
Land the free? For who? Home of the brave? Nothing brave about what’s happening.
We need to fix this. We have to fix this.
